Sjogren's, Dentures and the Ordeal of the nightmare money wise and pain wise to get "new teeth"...

Some Photo's of Me Recently after getting my dentures - I had never been one to smile in any photo's. I always hated my front teeth. I had "genetically" inherited my top two front teeth being "large". My Dad, my half-brother, I, and my son... and I am sure some of the other family on Dad's side all had the same. Plus my bottom teeth were not straight, and I had a 4 wheeler accident at 25 yrs old, that snapped the bottom half of one of those top front teeth off. I had it "built onto" and it stayed like that until earlier last years 2014, when Sjogren's took my teeth, quickly and quietly. It seemed it quietly came into my mouth, and within 4 months literally rotted about 8 of my teeth from the inside out, just leaving a "shell" that then broke off at the gum line. After having that happen about 4 times within 2 months, I went to see another dentist, who did a "surround" type of X-ray that showed just about every tooth I still had were also going to do the same thing. It was just a matter of a brief few months, and all of them would be falling out at the gum line, leaving me to have to have them pulled. So, I began to "weigh" my options that honestly, were slim to none. Even though it is an "illness" that literally rotted my teeth, and had nothing to do with my own dental hygiene etc... I could not get my insurance to pay one red cent on any of the massively expensive and time consuming work it would take to get me over the "Sjogren's rotting teeth" out of my mouth.

You are talking about somewhere in the neighborhood of 10,000.00 to actually more like 15 to 2o THOUSAND DOLLARS of dental work. I had to have ALL of the rest of my teeth pulled. Then due to my bone structure , the Sjogren's, the medications I have to take for the RA, Lupus and so forth, had also had its finger in the loss of every tooth in my mouth. That began about February 2014, and I still am not completely finished with the entire ordeal. After pulling sets of 5 to 7 teeth at one sitting, then they made my dentures, and pulled every last one in the top and bottom that had been left up front and visible. So, that was 11 TEETH in ONE sitting, and then they put the DENTURES RIGHT IN OVER THE TOP OF ALL OF THOSE STITCHES AND PULLED TEETH!! Surprisingly, it was not as painful as I thought, but for weeks and weeks and weeks, and even now I struggle about eating. There are certain things that in no way can I bite into or eat. Most everything has to be finely chopped up, even tomato and lettuce. I have to tear most things apart  in extremely tiny pieces. With the dentures I also don't have as much room in my mouth as I used to. Plus, I still lack going back and having "mini implanted little screw like devices" put into my lower jaw in four places, so that my bottom dentures will fit securely on those and not be moving around all the time. There is no way, I can keep them in place, without having those put in. So, that is another at least 3,500.00 for the four little pins and then adjusting the bottom dentures to fit down over those pins when all is finished. It is pure insanity, money wise, time wise, pain wise and the amount and length of time it takes to complete the entire ordeal. So, now after so many years of wishing for "beautiful teeth" so I can smile, I have them. I just never figured it would be because of some disease that ruined my own, and I would have to deal with a full set of "false teeth" or dentures. So, when you "ask" for something, you may get that "wish" fulfilled someday. BUT, remember it may NOT BE the WAY YOU HOPED for IT TO BE! So, here are a few new pics since my dentures have been put in.   

LOL!!!! Notice I STILL have a difficult time "smiling"... so many years of not because I hated my teeth... so breaking the habit is hard to do.  Rhia